Masked Ball at Broxley Manor: A Royal Spyness Novella

At the end of her first unsuccessful season out in society, Lady Georgiana has all but given up on attracting a suitable man - until she receives an invitation to a masked Halloween ball at Broxley Manor. Georgie is uncertain why she was invited, until she learns that the royal family intends to marry her off to a foreign prince, one reputed to be mad.

A Man of Some Repute: A Very English Mystery, Book 1

Selchester Castle in 1953 sits quiet and near-empty, its corridors echoing with glories of the past. Or so it seems to intelligence officer Hugo Hawksworth, wounded on a secret mission and now reluctantly assuming an altogether less perilous role at Selchester.

Still Life: Chief Inspector Gamache, Book 1

Chief Inspector Armand Gamache of the Surêté du Québec and his team of investigators are called in to the scene of a suspicious death in a rural village south of Montreal. Jane Neal, a local fixture in the tiny hamlet of Three Pines, just north of the U.S. border, has been found dead in the woods. The locals are certain it’s a tragic hunting accident and nothing more, but Gamache smells something foul in these remote woods, and is soon certain that Jane Neal died at the hands of someone much more sinister than a careless bowhunter.

Maisie Dobbs

Maisie Dobbs isn't just any young housemaid. Through her own natural intelligence - and the patronage of her benevolent employers - she works her way into college at Cambridge. After the War I and her service as a nurse, Maisie hangs out her shingle back at home: M. DOBBS, TRADE AND PERSONAL INVESTIGATIONS. But her very first assignment soon reveals a much deeper, darker web of secrets, which will force Maisie to revisit the horrors of the Great War and the love she left behind.

Chiefs

In 1919, Delano, Georgia, appoints its first chief of police. Honest and hardworking, the new chief is puzzled when young men start to disappear. But his investigation is ended by the fatal blast from a shotgun. Delano's second chief-of-police is no hero, yet he is also disturbed by what he sees in the missing-persons bulletins. In 1969, when Delano's third chief takes over, the unsolved disappearances still haunt the police files.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles: A Hercule Poirot Mystery

Captain Arthur Hastings, invalided in the Great War, is recuperating as a guest of John Cavendish at Styles Court, the "country-place" of John's autocratic old aunt, Emily Inglethorpe - she of a sizeable fortune, and so recently remarried to a man 20 years her junior. When Emily's sudden heart attack is found to be attributable to strychnine, Hastings recruits an old friend, now retired, to aid in the local investigation. With impeccable timing, Hercule Poirot, the famous Belgian detective, makes his dramatic entrance into the pages of crime literature.

Suspect

LAPD cop Scott James is not doing so well, not since a shocking nighttime assault by unidentified men killed his partner, Stephanie, nearly killed him, and left him enraged, ashamed, and ready to explode. He is unfit for duty - until he meets his new partner. Maggie is not doing so well, either. The German shepherd survived three tours in Iraq and Afghanistan sniffing explosives before she lost her handler to an IED and sniper attack, and her PTSD is as bad as Scott’s. They are each other’s last chance.

The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper

Sixty-nine-year-old Arthur Pepper lives a simple life. He gets out of bed at precisely 7:30 a.m., just as he did when his wife, Miriam, was alive. He dresses in the same gray slacks and mustard sweater-vest; waters his fern, Frederica; and heads out to his garden. But on the one-year anniversary of Miriam's death, something changes. Sorting through Miriam's possessions, Arthur finds an exquisite gold charm bracelet he's never seen before.

Neverwhere

Richard Mayhew is an unassuming young businessman living in London, with a dull job and a pretty but shrewish fiancée. Then one night he stumbles upon a girl lying on the sidewalk, bleeding. He stops to help her, and his life is changed forever. Soon he finds himself living in a London most people would never have dreamed of: a city of monsters and saints, murderers and angels. It is a world that exists entirely in a subterranean labyrinth of sewer canals and abandoned subway stations.

Cocaine Blues

It's the end of the roaring twenties, and the exuberant and Honourable Phryne Fisher is dancing and gaming with gay abandon. But she becomes bored with London and the endless round of parties. In search of excitement, she sets her sights on a spot of detective work in Melbourne, Australia. And so mystery and the beautiful Russian dancer, Sasha de Lisse, appear in her life. From then on it's all cocaine and communism until her adventure reaches its steamy end in the Turkish baths of Little Lonsdale Street.

The Secret Garden

When Mary Lennox's parents die from cholera in India, the spoiled orphan is transplanted to her uncle's 600-year-old gloomy and secretive estate in England. She is certain that she is destined for misery at Misselthwaite Manor. However, she soon discovers an arched doorway into an overgrown garden, locked shut since the death of her aunt 10 years earlier.

The Cuckoo's Calling

After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Then John Bristow walks through his door with an amazing story: his sister, the legendary supermodel Lula Landry, famously fell to her death a few months earlier. The police ruled it a suicide, but John refuses to believe that. The case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers, and it introduces him to every variety of pleasure, enticement, seduction, and delusion known to man.

The Snow Child

Debut novelist Eowyn ivey’s experience living in the Alaskan wilderness brings a palpable authenticity to The Snow Child. Alaska in the 1920s is a difficult place for Jack and Mabel. Drifting apart, the childless couple discover Faina, a young girl living alone in the wilderness. Soon, Jack and Mabel come to love Faina as their own. But when they learn a surprising truth about the girl, their lives change in profound ways.

Three Wishes

In this wise, witty, hilarious new novel, we follow the Kettle sisters through their 33rd year, as they struggle to survive their divorced parents' dating each other, their technologically savvy grandmother, a cheating husband, champagne hangovers, and the fabulous, frustrating life of forever being part of a threesome.

The Cold Dish: A Walt Longmire Mystery

Award-winning author Craig Johnson's critically acclaimed debut Western mystery takes listeners to the breathtaking mountains of Wyoming for a tale of cold-blooded vengeance. Four high-school boys were given suspended sentences for raping a Cheyenne girl. Now, two of the boys have been killed, and only Sheriff Walt Longmire can keep the other two safe.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette: A Novel

Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she's a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she's a disgrace; to design mavens, she's a revolutionary architect, and to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, simply, Mom.

Then Bernadette disappears. It began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette's intensifying allergy to Seattle - and people in general - has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in India now runs her most basic errands.

The Winds of War

Herman Wouk's sweeping epic of World War II stands as the crowning achievement of one of America's most celebrated storytellers. Like no other books about the war, Wouk's spellbinding narrative captures the tide of global events - and all the drama, romance, heroism, and tragedy of World War II - as it immerses us in the lives of a single American family drawn into the very center of the war's maelstrom.

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

It is the summer of 1950 and a series of inexplicable events has struck Buckshaw, the decaying English mansion that Flavia's family calls home. A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath. For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw.

The Pickwick Papers

The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (commonly known as The Pickwick Papers) is the first novel by Charles Dickens. The book became the first real publishing phenomenon, with bootleg copies, theatrical performances, Sam Weller joke books and other merchandise.

This Pen for Hire: A Jaine Austen Mystery

Smarmy personals ads. Daring declarations of love. Writer-for-hire Jaine Austen has penned them all. But when one of the love connections she made is broken up by murder, Jaine finds herself freelancing free-of-charge - and uncovering more than she bargained for…No one seems to need her help more than geeky, gawky Howard Murdoch. His request is simple enough: a letter proclaiming his undying love for Stacy Lawrence, a gorgeous aerobics instructor.

The Heist: A Novel

FBI Special Agent Kate O’Hare is known for her fierce dedication and discipline on the job, chasing down the world’s most wanted criminals and putting them behind bars. Her boss thinks she is tenacious and ambitious; her friends think she is tough, stubborn, and maybe even a bit obsessed. And while Kate has made quite a name for herself for the past five years the only name she’s cared about is Nicolas Fox - an international crook she wants in more ways than one.

My Man Jeeves

A new Jeeves audiobook is cause for celebration, especially when the stories are not available in print. This hilarious installment of the inimitable manservant Jeeves and his twit of an employer, Bertie Wooster, includes the earliest stories written by the master of the pen, prank, and pun. The stories are woven together with original material performed by Martin Jarvis.

A Spy's Devotion: The Regency Spies of London, Book 1

In England's Regency era, manners and elegance reign in public life - but behind closed doors treason and deception thrive. Nicholas Langdon is no stranger to reserved civility or bloody barbarity. After suffering a battlefield injury, the wealthy, well-connected British officer returns home to heal - and to fulfill a dying soldier's last wish by delivering his coded diary.

Fishbowl: A Novel

A goldfish named Ian is falling from the 27th-floor balcony on which his fishbowl sits. He's longed for adventure, so when the opportunity arises, he escapes from his bowl, clears the balcony railing and finds himself airborne. Plummeting toward the street below, Ian witnesses the lives of the Seville on Roxy residents.

Publisher's Summary

Mrs. Virgil (Emily) Pollifax of New Brunswick, New Jersey, was a widow with grown children. She was tired of attending her Garden Club meetings. She wanted to do something good for her country. This first in the series sends Emily on her first case after she successfully persuades a skeptical CIA recruitment officer that she is the best person for the job.

My dear fellow readers: I strongly recommend this audiobook to anyone who loves to hear a good story! Dorothy Gilmore writes a fascinating story about 60 year old Mrs. Pollifax who becomes a CIA courier... Say what!? Yes, and it is so riveting that I have BOTH the audiobooks AND the books -- and I love listening or reading EVERYTIME! Want a great book... the Pollifax series of stories are AWESOME!!

Any audiobooks narrated by Barbara Rosenblatt are awesome with her gift of hundreds of voices and accents. She stays true to Mrs.Pollifax's voice in each recording. You just fall in love with that spunky little lady with the outrageous hats. Unfortunately not all of the Pollifax books are read by Ms. Rosenblatt and are totally uninspiring! So watch out who the narrator is for these books.

Mrs. Pollifax walking into CIA headquarters and asking for a job as a spy is an amusing scene. When her interviewer tells her that the CIA generally comes looking for spies rather than the other way around, she replies that they haven't found her though they've had over 60 years to do so. Her adventures are just barely outside the believable, but we are not reading a spy novel that could be true. Readers who quibble over this are missing the point and the sheer fun. The plot is well thought out and keeps you interested and guessing. This is a light-hearted yet suspenseful romp, not a Tom Clancy novel.Despite the narrator making Mrs. Pollifax's voice seem to be perhaps 90 instead of in her 69's, Barbara Rosenblatt nails the characters and differentiates the voices wonderfully. Narration is among the better performances on Audible that I have heard.

I first heard about Mrs. Pollifax 20 years ago. Now that I am 55, I found it hugely entertaining that a 58 year old woman convinced the CIA to let her be a spy. This series is well worth the time. You'll be disappointed, though, to find out two of the books are not available at Audible. Request those at your local library. They are number 5 and 6, I think.

I bought this book because it was on sale. Typically I would not purchase a book like this because I am a 50 year old man, but I enjoyed it. Somewhat silly at times, but always fun. So many CIA/Spy thrillers have the 40 year kung fu master who can use any weapon know to man, jump in a helicopter and fly it, and can hack any computer known to man. Not Mrs Pollifax. She can barely walk 5 miles, but manages to get out of trouble because no one would ever see her as a threat. Hey, who would ever expect their mother or grandmother of being a CIA agent?Again, kind of silly but it works. Although I hate to characterize this a a "chick" book, I would see where any woman over 50 would enjoy this. I know it's probably not fair to stereotype this book, I do believe am elderly audience would identify with this.

Most series mysteries leave me either impatient for more action, irritated as protagonists hop in and out of bed as if no one is trying to kill them, or wondering how the insubstantial protagonists could leap from one suspension of disbelief to another and expect any rational mind to follow.

Mrs. Pollifax, however, could sell wool to a shepherd and entice him to follow her into town where she would instruct him not only in how to knit, but have him gladly finishing a sweater for her to wear that very day.

Usually, I also tire when action scene is followed by more suspense, more trouble, more questions. However, Gilman deftly balances anxiety and hope, not only in the plot line, but in the overarching tone and philosophy of the book. I will soon purchase the sequel.

I read the Mrs. Pollifax series years ago and loved listening to them as audiobooks. When I grow up I want to be Mrs. P. Barbara Rosenblat reads Mrs. P in an older voice than I had previously imagined, but she is still wonderful. Try to read them - at least the first three - in order: The Unexpected Mrs. P, the Amazing Mrs. P and The Ellusive Mrs. P. Your credits will not be wasted.

This is a delightful tale of a depressed older lady who begins to think that her life no longer holds meaning. She decides that what she would really like to do is be a spy. The tale unfolds and Mrs. Pollifax has the adventure of a lifetime. I just loved this story... I found it fun and yet, poignant. I felt that Barbara Rosenblat did a wonderful job of doing Mrs. Pollifax's voice. I would like to see some sequels down the road and follow Mrs. Pollifax on more adventures. Bravo Dorothy Gilman.

If you could sum up The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax in three words, what would they be?

A listening pleasure

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax?

At the beginning of the book Mrs. Pollifax thinks her life is over because she is a widow and her life has no purpose. She comes to realize that she is still a very important part of a lot of lives and though over sixty, still has a lot to contribute.

Have you listened to any of Barbara Rosenblat???s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Barbara Rosenblat is able to portray characters of all ages, both genders, and with a variety of accents so that it is easy to follow the different characters and to know who is talking.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The whole book is a journey, as Mrs. Pollifax makes friends in the most unlikely places.

Any additional comments?

Mrs. Pollifax is a delightful, developing character. Even though at times she seems (as she is) from another world than the one we live in now, she adapts and uses her life experience to solve the problems she encounters. She is a good lesson for any baby boomer.

I loved this book! It is just so fun! I love Mrs. Polifax and totally imagined Angela Lansbury or someone of that caliber playing the part! It is just the right amount of light, yet suspenseful! Please.....someone make a movie but make sure you hire just the right lead. For example NOT Angelina Jolie (as they have for Scarpetta.ugh!)
Off to download the second book now :)